


The Barton Legacy

by raiining



Category: Bourne Legacy (2012), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Clint Barton is Aaron Cross, Fix-It, M/M, Spoilers for both movies, Staying lost is hard when S.H.I.E.L.D. is searching for you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-16
Updated: 2012-09-16
Packaged: 2017-11-14 09:01:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/513546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raiining/pseuds/raiining
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was the virus that had done him in.</p>
<p>He’d already been pretty fucked up after New York.  When the mission had come up, he’d gladly buried himself in Aaron Cross so he didn't have to be Clint Barton.  But the drugs he had been taking, the ones he’d <i>thought</i> had been switched out by medical, obviously hadn't been.  Clint had started slipping in Alaska, and by the time Marta had pressed a needle to his arm all he had been able to say was "Thank you."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this immediately after I saw the movie, but lost it in my gmail 'works in progress' file. Found it the other day and JediButtercup helped me wrestle it into something post-able. 
> 
> All mistakes left are mine!

It was the virus that had done him in.

He’d already been pretty fucked up after New York. When the mission had come up, he’d gladly buried himself in Aaron Cross so he didn't have to be Clint Barton. But the drugs he had been taking, the ones he’d _thought_ had been switched out by medical, obviously hadn't been. Clint had started slipping in Alaska, and by the time Marta had pressed a needle to his arm all he had been able to say was "Thank you."

By the time he woke up, all traces of Clint Barton were gone. He was Aaron Cross. He always had been Aaron Cross.

There is nothing this woman can say that will change that.

"Clint," the woman says, again, and Aaron doesn't shift, doesn't startle, because the name means nothing to him. Instead he holds the gun steady and tries to work out how she could have found them in the day since they'd come ashore.

She looks sadly at him, but turns and walks away without another word. Aaron watches her go, gun trained on her open and waiting back. He doesn't shoot her.

She isn't with the program. He doesn't know how he knows that, guesses maybe it's the way she walks, the faintly Russian lit to her voice. But he knows she's not from Outcome.

She's from something else.

He keeps hyper-vigilant for days. He won't let Marta eat or go to the bathroom without carefully casing the place out. She is starting to get tired of this, but what other option do they have? It's stay lost or stay dead, and they've already chosen to live. 

He doesn't know what they're living for.

But despite his best efforts, some things start to fall apart. They have no money and no contacts. The aliases he'd constructed for them in the States have been burned. He keeps them off the grid, travels mainly by barter and cash, but things are starting to run low.

When he sees the pawn shop in Japan, Aaron has cased the place, ducked into the back corner around the security camera, and stolen four hundred dollars of non-traceable goods before he's even conscious of what he is planning to do. Two blocks later he's staring at his hands and shaking. 

Aaron does not know how to steal from pawn shops. If he'd had time to think about it and plan, glance over the items - maybe. But he hadn't. He'd simply gone in and come out with what they needed to stay alive.

Like he's done this before.

But he hasn't.

He shoves his hands and the goods back in his pockets and meets up with Marta at the crummy hotel they're staying at that night. He fakes it through the afternoon with her, covers his growing confusion, but when he wakes, screaming, with a man's name on his lips, he is frightened. 

Marta asks who Phil is.

Aaron doesn't know.

But he does know that whoever he is, he's dead. 

He tries to go back to sleep, but he can't and Marta can't either. By mutual agreement they pack up the hotel room, wipe their prints, and take off again. 

But the dreams have started.

It's not always the man in the suit. Sometimes it’s the red head from the bar, sometimes other people Aaron doesn't know. Their names slip away on the morning breeze, but despite the fact that he thinks he's losing his mind, he starts looking forward to sleep. Whoever these people are, they seem to care about him. He finds himself missing them when he's awake.

That is, until he dreams of a tall man dressed in green framed by a sharp blue light. After that he doesn't sleep again for a week. Instead he catches cat naps while Marta drives. He doesn't look forward to sleep again.

Whatever happened, whatever he did ... he doesn't think those people care about him any more. He doesn't think they're missing him.

He forgets that the red haired woman came for him once, and doesn't remember until she comes again. But this time she's not alone.

This time, when he walks into the roadside diner to case it before letting Marta in, she's standing at the bar with the man in the suit. Aaron stops, shocked. Because this man is supposed to be dead. Is dead. He's sure of it, as sure of it as he's ever been of anything.

But the man stands from his chair and calls him 'Clint' and, suddenly, Aaron isn't half as sure of anything as he used to be.

Marta, contrary to their pre-arranged signal, doesn't tear the hell out of there when he falls to the ground. Instead, stupidly, she runs over to him. She has a pistol in her hand and it's pointed at the man in the suit with hands that have grown steady in the face of adrenalin, if not comfortable with the sensation.

"Get away from him," she says steadily. Aaron's legs are jelly, his thoughts are a mess. He wants to stop her and he wants to run. Because this man, this suit, this is _Phil_. 

This is Phil, and Aaron still isn't sure who he is, but he knows that if he's not dead he might have found something to live for.

Phil looks at Marta with a carefully controlled expression of blankness that is so practiced as to be practically perfect. Aaron doesn't know how he can recognize the anger underneath it, but he does. He tenses, wondering if his legs will support him if he decides to run, but then Phil shifts his gaze back to him and all the air leaves his lungs in one breath.

This is a man who loves him.

"Phil" he says, and it’s like a prayer. Like a promise.

Phil crouches beside him, carefully just inside Aaron's reach, and stares at him. "Do you remember me?" he asks.

Aaron shakes his head. He catches Phil's carefully masked disappointment before he says. "Not entirely. Do I want to?"

Phil smiles. Its careful and complicated and oh so fucking sweet. "Yes, Clint. You want to."

Aaron - Clint - breaths steadily through that. He shifts, gets his feet under him, and tries to stand up. His legs wobble, but they hold.

"Are you sure about that?" he asks, faintly teasing but also completely serious. "Because I seem to think you should be dead. And I'm really not feeling up to a complete mental breakdown right now."

Phil rises with him, hands carefully at his sides. "I was dead," he agrees, calmly, like that's something people just fucking _say_. "But I'm better now."

He nods. Something worth living for after all. 

"Okay then."


	2. Chapter 2

It takes them a careful two weeks to get Stateside again. He knows they're taking it slow, Phil and Natasha, understands things could be happening faster if he wanted them to. But he's okay with the idea of taking their time. 

The memories had start to break out again over night, but this time Phil is there when he wakes up screaming, and eases him through the hiccups that come after. He's at his side with a glass of water before he could even frame the words to ask, and he's grateful for that.

He knows it means something, just like he understands the carefully fond looks Natasha - she said her name was Natasha - throws at him. 

Marta they don't seem to like at all, and he's not sure if it’s some strange sort of possessive jealousy or because she's a scientist. He asks Phil, one day, while they're travelling through Europe by train, once Marta has gone for a walk down the aisle with Natasha. 

"It's because she did everything she was told to without thinking of the consequences, without realizing that 'because they told me to' wasn't ever going to be good enough," Phil tells him. He pauses, then adds, "And maybe a little jealousy."

Clint - because he's starting to think of himself more as Clint now - arches an eyebrow at him. "We didn't actually sleep together, you know."

"Good," Phil says, meeting his eye. Clint swallows.

By the time they finally get back to H.Q. Clint is almost sure that he remembers the important stuff. Phil and Natasha call ahead and make sure their path to the medical ward is clear. Clint thinks Phil has gone to the trouble to have people he will be completely unfamiliar with meet him and take his blood samples. They let Marta have access to some of the equipment and she winces to let them know that the virus is still active in Clint's bloodstream. Both aspects of it. But it appears to be integrated into his cells.

This doesn't mean he won't get his memory back, she assures Phil, hands raised slightly. It just means that it will take more time.

It takes four months, in the end, for Clint to find every piece of himself and thread it all back together. Nat helps, and Phil is fucking indispensable, but the rest of the Avengers jump in, too. It comes together mostly at night for him, memory settling while he sleeps, and one morning he wakes with the memory of his father's whiskey drunk breath and Barney's angry shouts and he thinks _Oh_.

I'm Clint Barton.

He wakes Phil with kisses that morning, biting at his lower lip the way he liked, and Phil goes from deep asleep to wide awake in 2.6 seconds.

"Clint?" he asks, breathless, staring into his eyes. 

Clint nods.

Phil closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. When he opens them again his gaze is glistening slightly. 

"It's good to have you back, Agent." Phil says. Clint dives back in for another bite at his bottom lip. 

"It's good to be back, Sir."


End file.
